Re: [RFC 06/14] fork: zero vmap stack using clear_page() instead of memset()

[Christophe Leroy <christophe.leroy@csgroup.eu>]

Le 12/03/2024 à 17:53, Pasha Tatashin a écrit :
> On Tue, Mar 12, 2024 at 3:16 AM Nikolay Borisov <nik.borisov@suse.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On 11.03.24 г. 18:46 ч., Pasha Tatashin wrote:
>>> In preporation for dynamic kernel stacks do not zero the whole span of
>>> the stack, but instead only the pages that are part of the vm_area.
>>>
>>> This is because with dynamic stacks we might have only partially
>>> populated stacks.
>>>
>>> Signed-off-by: Pasha Tatashin <pasha.tatashin@soleen.com>
>>> ---
>>>    kernel/fork.c | 6 ++++--
>>>    1 file changed, 4 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
>>>
>>> diff --git a/kernel/fork.c b/kernel/fork.c
>>> index 6a2f2c85e09f..41e0baee79d2 100644
>>> --- a/kernel/fork.c
>>> +++ b/kernel/fork.c
>>> @@ -263,8 +263,8 @@ static int memcg_charge_kernel_stack(struct vm_struct *vm)
>>>    static int alloc_thread_stack_node(struct task_struct *tsk, int node)
>>>    {
>>>        struct vm_struct *vm_area;
>>> +     int i, j, nr_pages;
>>>        void *stack;
>>> -     int i;
>>>
>>>        for (i = 0; i < NR_CACHED_STACKS; i++) {
>>>                vm_area = this_cpu_xchg(cached_stacks[i], NULL);
>>> @@ -282,7 +282,9 @@ static int alloc_thread_stack_node(struct task_struct *tsk, int node)
>>>                stack = kasan_reset_tag(vm_area->addr);
>>>
>>>                /* Clear stale pointers from reused stack. */
>>> -             memset(stack, 0, THREAD_SIZE);
>>> +             nr_pages = vm_area->nr_pages;
>>> +             for (j = 0; j < nr_pages; j++)
>>> +                     clear_page(page_address(vm_area->pages[j]));
>>
>> Can't this be memset(stack, 0, nr_pages*PAGE_SIZE) ?
> 
> No, we can't, because the pages can be physically discontiguous.
> 

But the pages were already physically discontiguous before your change, 
what's the difference ?

It doesn't matter that the pages are physically discontiguous as far as 
they are virtually contiguous, which should still be the case here for a 
stack.

Nevertheless, from powerpc point of view I'm happy with clear_page() 
which is more optimised than memset(0)

Christophe